People buy residential landscape services because they want to have experiences outside with their family and friends in a beautiful environment. But, how do you sell experiences to people before they even have them? In today's episode, Landscape Architecture owner Joe Hanauer shares how he uses photos to sell experiences, plus the technology that he uses in the sales process he's developed over the last 25 years, including how he does site surveys quickly and efficiently using a cool program. Joe shares personal business stories, like how he did door to door sales to sell snow removal services just to survive, to now running a design-build firm with a wait list. Listen to Joe for the ups and downs of growing a big team, and then having to let nearly half of his staff go during the '08 recession, to what's it like now running a smaller organization. Check out this episode for tons of actionable sales tips, including how to get away with charging for consultations, even when you're a nice Midwesterner in a town where no one else charges for consultations, and why charging for consultations ultimately serves your customer better.
Hey, everyone, Jack Jostes is here, and welcome to The Landscaper's Guide. I'm super excited to have Joe Hanauer on the show, because he's not only a tremendous landscape designer, he's also an excellent public speaker and a dynamic podcast guest. In today's episode, we talk about one of my absolute favorite topics and specialties, sales process. A small adjustment and improvement in your sales process can not only massively increase your revenue and profit, but it can also significantly improve your quality of life by saving you hours and hours every week from meeting with unqualified leads, or it can save hours and hours a week for the people who are doing sales at your company if it's not you.
If you'd like to work directly with me on your sales process, I invite you to join me at one of my two upcoming sales process workshops. On May 19th, I'll be presenting the SIMA Compass Network sales jam, available exclusively to active SIMA members. On May 26th, I'll present The Landscaper's Guide to Advanced Lead Qualification. You can't miss these events, so check out the show notes for a link to landscapersguide.com/events, where you can get more information. Now, let's hear what Joe has to say about his experience running Landscape Architecture over the last 25 years.
All right, everyone, welcome to the landscaper's guide. Today, I'm really excited to interview Joe Hanauer. He's the owner of Landscape Architecture in Madison, Wisconsin. Joe and I, I'm trying to remember where we connected originally, but we then finally met. We were both speakers at iLandscape in February of 2022, and you presented on technology. I really enjoyed it. Thanks so much for coming on the show. Tell us a little bit about your company and what kind of work you do.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, so I have a company, it's called Landscape Architecture. We're in Madison, Wisconsin. This is our 25th year of business, so we've been very blessed to be around for quite a long time and through the ups and downs. Typically, I have about 10 to 12 employees through the season, and we focus mainly on design-build. I like to say we're kind of a boutique design-build company. We'll do anything outdoors that really leads to creating a great outdoor space for our customers, whether it's pergola lighting, fire features, really just about anything, we can build it and do it and can do most of it in house. We also get involved in a little bit of snow removal services. That's about 10% of our business, but we don't get involved in other maintenance.
Jack Jostes:
Well, that's really interesting. It's fun talking with landscapers and working with landscapers. None of them, no two companies have the same service markup.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
I don't know anyone else who does 10% snow, but no other maintenance, as an example.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, right.
Jack Jostes:
It is always interesting. Before we started recording, I wanted to hear some of the personal story of how you got into snow back in the day. Like, what happened?
Joe Hanauer:
Well, my wife was pregnant and we had a friend that she grew up with that had moved to California and got married, and her husband had never seen fall colors. They came to Wisconsin in October, we went up to Door County, and really had a nice week. I got back to work and was told that we had one week left to work. The company was going out of business on that Friday, so we had one last week. I found out that car dealerships will sell a truck and sell a snow plow to just about anybody, so I bought one and I went door to door and sold a bunch of snow removal and supported our family that winter. That was the launch of Landscape Architecture.
Jack Jostes:
You started out doing door to door sales, selling snow removal to survive, to feed your family.
Joe Hanauer:
Yep.
Jack Jostes:
Suddenly out of a job, and now you run Landscape Architecture, and you're doing outdoor living and design-build projects. Through some of our personal conversations I've heard, what's it been like through the 25 years? Tell us a little bit about some of the challenges that you've had, and where are you at now in your career? I really enjoy the perspective you have on what you're doing and you're enjoying what you're doing, and it's partly through some of these challenges, so tell us some of the stories.
Joe Hanauer's Personal Business Stories
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah. First of all, I mean, I became a landscape architect primarily, believe it or not, I was accepted at West Point. I was going to West Point and going to be in the Army. I ended up tearing up my knee in my last year of high school and couldn't go. I didn't know what I was going to do. My dad basically said, "Hey, you love being outside. You love art. Why not try landscape architecture?" I applied to the University of Wisconsin, was accepted, and have a degree in landscape architecture. I also have a degree in horticulture, because I just believe the plants are really important for what we do as well. I only tell that because I really view myself as an artist. I love art, I love design, and that's what I enjoy doing.
When I started the business, I actually started as a designer, and I would really design a for other companies. I designed for a lot of other companies, and I found a couple of things. One, I couldn't figure out why I wasn't getting a lot of second chances with customers. In other words, we do a project with them, and then I wouldn't work with them again. I found that a lot of my landscape companies were kind of cutting me out. I also found that I was getting very suspicious quality in the work, and was basically told a couple times, "Just don't even worry about it. This is what we're doing," and it really bothered me. I just couldn't handle that, because that's just not the way I was brought up. I was selling something, and companies weren't really putting in what I was selling. You'd covered up with bark or a little bit of mulch, and nobody knows. That's just not me.
I thought, "You know what? I want to run a business the way I want to run a business." I want to have good relationships with vendors. I want to be able to call a vendor, and if I need something, they're able to deliver it for me or get it to me because we have a great relationship. I think part of that is just being a good customer, as well as being a good person, and then just working the way we should work. That was all part of my idea of how I wanted to grow my business and develop it.
Jack Jostes:
One of the things that I took away from your presentation at iLandscape that I'm noticing as I've kind of reviewed your website, is that you do a lot of your own photography.
Joe Hanauer:
Yes.
Jack Jostes:
Even though you don't maintain your landscapes, you're able to go and get a photo 2, 3, 5 years later of a mature landscape.
Joe Hanauer:
Yes.
Jack Jostes:
A lot of your photos are of, there's color in here. I'm looking at some of these patios with some of the annuals in there.
Joe Hanauer:
Yep.
Jack Jostes:
Tell us a little bit about, how did you learn to do photography?
How Joe Uses Photos To Sell Experiences
Joe Hanauer:
I've done a lot of reading and a lot of just playing with the camera. Again, I love photography, and I wish I knew more about it. But, I always carry a camera. I believe that's one of the things you should always have, so I've got a good digital DSLR camera, and I like to shoot with a wide angle lens. I do have a couple other lenses for when I'm seeing something and I want to shoot it a little differently, but 90% or 95% of my pictures are with a wide angle lens. I kind of have this feeling that I designed it, I built it, I can give a unique perspective to the photograph, versus hiring a photographer to do it. I wanted to learn enough about photography that I could take good pictures.
The other thing, with social media today, and with blogging and other things we do as marketing, I want them to be my projects. I don't want stock photos on a blog, for example. I believe very strongly that it needs to be my photograph. I mean, I don't necessarily need to be the photographer, but it needs to be my project. That's just a very strong belief of mine, so I take a lot of pictures. Since I always have my camera with me, if I'm driving by a site and it looks great, I just stop. I think so often we're selling experiences to people. If I'm using pictures in a photograph, or pictures to sell, for example, I want them to see themselves in that landscape. I want them to be able to see themselves drinking a cup of coffee or reading the paper or reading a book. I'll zoom in and I'll shoot what I call vignettes. I might get a vignette of a rocking chair on a front porch with some flowers around it. I might get a vignette of a fire table and where people might be sitting. I think it's important to get the full picture, but also get these little vignettes of where they could see themselves.
Jack Jostes:
I love that you mentioned vignettes, as far as photos of telling a story of where somebody's going to use this space, and how they're going to use it. I'm curious, in your sales and ultimately in your design process, how do you work through with clients about how they're going to use this space?
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah. First of all, I very rarely just am, when I'm talking to clients, I very rarely just say, "This is the patio. This is the outline of it." That doesn't really tell a story at all. But, if I'm selling someone an experience, I would more come across like, "This is your patio. I've got some flowers that you're going to see, or look out through your windows and see these flowers, you'll see your patio. But, then we have these couple areas to sit." I almost always in my plans will draw furniture and things in it. Some of it's for scale, but some of it's so it can help a customer see it. But, as far as really putting people in the space, if I'm in someone's yard, or if I'm doing a Zoom call with them, I'm constantly pulling up photographs. I have all my photographs indexed, so I have indexes for steps, I have indexes for fire tables, I have indexes for boulder walls. I have indexes for all the different things I sell, and I just put all my favorite photographs in those kind of indexes.
The Ups And Downs Of Growing A Bigger Team
Jack Jostes:
Talk to me about some of, over the 25 years you've grown, you've expanded, and then you've had to contract at times and maybe downsize.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jack Jostes:
Now, tell us some of that, and where are you at now in the growth journey?
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah. I already mentioned, yeah, I started knocking on doors to sell snow, and then that expanded into buying some equipment and hiring some people. That really skyrocketed fast. We grew pretty quickly, and got to the point where I had over 20 employees, 25 employees. I was absolutely running ragged. Jack, I've listened to a lot of your podcasts, and I don't remember who it was, but someone said to get your systems in place first and then grow. Me, I didn't do that. I decided to take this dive into construction, and we grew very quickly without any systems in place.
Then '07, '08 happened. The big recession in '07, '08, and I had a fair amount of people at the time. I had office staff, and things were going well, but I was running ragged. With that contraction of the recession, I had to let people go, and mainly my office staff. We shrunk our company in half in terms of people. I kind of made a decision at that point in time to explore technology as much as I can, and use applications, vector, not vector, applications, software, hardware, whatever I can in order to be as efficient as I can and grow what I can do. I had to grow what my abilities are, and that's worked out phenomenally, that's worked out great.
The other thing that I should note, and this is just an argument to have your systems in place before you grow, is that when I did this, when we contracted, we billed a lot less, our gross came way down, but our net did not. Our net actually went up. When I saw my net go up and I saw that I wasn't running myself quite as ragged, I thought, "This isn't bad. I'm comfortable with where I am. I'm making enough income for me, and it allows me to do what I love," and return really to the designing and seeing people's dreams come true.
I made the decision then that I'm okay with my size. I don't have to keep growing like crazy, and I know to some pure business people that might sound like heresy and awful, but it's been fine for us. We have grown. I mean, we have grown and we've expanded. I mentioned the furniture and other things, so we've explored other areas and other markets, and we have grown. But, we've really focused on our business. Now we're back. We're bigger than we used to be with half the employees, and our income is doing really well. I'm really happy with where we are. It's a good size right now.
Jack Jostes:
That's really hard to let people go for that reason.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
I know I feel the same way about my people. Right?
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, yeah.
Jack Jostes:
That, they're not just a number to me.
Joe Hanauer:
Right, right.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I haven't had that experience, but I fear that experience and I don't want that experience. Right?
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, it's not fun. It really was not fun. But, I found the technology has just really helped me a lot. It happened to coincide with a time I used to use a different software to design with and produce my drawings with, and it was making a change in how they were doing business, which was going to increase my cost substantially, so I looked at other options. I had to buy a new CAD system at that point, because I wouldn't be able to afford the way this other company was changing how they were doing things.
I looked at different systems, and keep in mind, this is probably 2010, maybe 2009-ish. It's a point in time where we were still printing drawings. We were still taking colored pencils and magic markers and coloring over the top of them to make plans look pretty when we're selling them. 3D things were just kind of coming out, and sketch up was around, but people weren't really using it an incredible amount yet. When I was looking at it, there were a couple things I wanted my software to be able to do. One is I wanted to be able to produce a colored plan quickly, and I also wanted to be able to work in 3D with the software. I wanted a plan, I wanted software that I could work in 2D and 3D concurrently at the exact same time. Those were important things to me, and I settled on a software called Vectorworks, which I think has been great, so I made that change.
The next thing I incorporated was getting a GPS surveyor. This is a few years later now. I just have always looked at things that take me a long time. If something really takes me a tremendous amount of time, and I spend a lot of time on it, there's got to be a faster way. There just has to be. When I'm measuring a property, if I've got to get grades on there, you're kind of creating a grid work in a yard, and it takes you hours to measure a yard when you're doing that and trying to get it accurate. Then it takes you just as long or longer to import that into a CAD system or a paper drawing.
What I found is that GPS, I could buy a surveyor with, it's a GPS unit. It takes a latitude, longitude, and height above sea level when I measure a site. If I'm going along a patio or a plant bed or a driveway, or whatever, I can label it. I can just call it driveway, go along the edge of it, and it'll give me X, Y, and Z, or latitude, longitude, and height above sea level. I can then import that directly into my CAD system, and it comes out looking kind of like a connect-the-dots, but I also can within minutes create a 3D image of that or a model of someone's yard. This is amazing to me, in that it saves me, what used to take me 20 hours, now I do in about two. That's a tremendous time savings, tremendous.
But, on the other hand, you got to look at the accuracy of it. I mean, I can't tell you in the old days, how many times I would pull tape measures out, think I have everything perfect. I was really accurate, I was really careful. I design my patio, and my guys go out and lay it out and install it, and then I get that magic phone call that says, "Joe, there's an Oak tree in the middle of this patio." Somewhere along the line, I either made the mistake measuring, or I made the mistake transposing it into a CAD system.
Jack Jostes:
Right.
Joe Hanauer:
But, somewhere along the line, I made a mistake. I don't make those mistakes anymore. They're not there.
Technology Behind The Sales Process Joe Hanauer Created Over The Last Twenty-five Years
Jack Jostes:
You're using Vectorworks for your designs. You're using the GPS surveyor. What other technology is now part of your stack that you just couldn't live without?
Joe Hanauer:
I use an iPad tremendously. I use my iPad probably just as much as my computer. I have an iPad Pro and I have a pencil that goes along with that, and it allows me to, I basically have everything I used to carry. Think about the days of carrying books with pictures in it of different plants, and photo albums, and all these different things that we used to carry to job meetings. Now it's all contained in one little iPad. On my iPad, I have iBooks, which I can download all the catalogs I use. I have lighting catalogs, I have paver catalogs, I have fire pit, and the furniture catalogs, they're all in there, so that's really easy. I've got all my photographs. I'm Mac based, so everything is Mac based for me. When you're on a Mac, you sign in with one single Apple ID and everything links together. But, I'm always using those photos, again, not just to show people so that they see what's available and what they can do, but it's also qualifying myself, and it creates a very high sales level. It gets to the point where people don't call other people. Of course, I also charge design fees and I also charge consultation fees, so I don't really-
Jack Jostes:
Well, let's talk about that. At one point, you had over 20 people.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
You've cut down to about half of that.
Joe Hanauer:
Yep.
Jack Jostes:
You increase your technology significantly.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
You personally answer the phone. You sometimes have a year wait list.
Joe Hanauer:
Yep.
Should You Charge For Consultations?
Jack Jostes:
I recommend all my clients to charge for the consultation, and the ones that are doing it are just, they'll never go back. Right? It just works so well, but there's a lot of fear around doing it. "Oh, my customers won't do that. Oh, people in Wisconsin won't do that, I'm sure," but they do. They do it in Texas and they do it in Virginia. I have clients all over the place. Tell us a little bit about charging for the consultation, and how do you get away with that? Right?
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah. I went through everything you just said. It was very difficult for me to do. I was convinced it wasn't going to work in our market, and I just didn't think it would. But, honestly, it got to the point where I was getting so many leads and so many phone calls, I was not able to respond to everybody. I was doing a disservice to my customers. I would go out, I'd meet with them, and then I literally couldn't get back to them. I don't want to be that person.
Jack Jostes:
Right.
Joe Hanauer:
Right?
Jack Jostes:
Yeah.
Joe Hanauer:
What I decided to do, and at the same time, I spent a tremendous amount of time on a project once, and this was the straw that broke the camel's back. I was working on a project. The customer actually shared another company's drawings with me, just showed me pictures on his phone, he didn't actually give them to me. But, so I knew they were talking to other people. I just casually mentioned I charge a design fee, and without ever having them to sign a design contract or anything. I said, "Well, that's okay, that's fine. Go ahead. That's fine." I spent all kinds of time with them. They liked the drawings. They liked what I produced. I did them all in three dimensions, showed them different options.
I get to the point where I think I'm going to a meeting to sign a contract. I'm all excited. It's a big contract. It's a beautiful project. I give them the numbers, and I forget exactly what it was. I want to say it was $180,000 or $200,000 project, whatever. They looked at me, and they were like, "You need to explain why you're so much more than your competitor. I got another bid at $100,000." It was about half. It wasn't half, but let's just say it was half. Part of this project was an elevated patio. You had a bunch of fill and all this different stuff, and I kind of looked at him and I said, "Well, maybe you need to explain to me why they're half. Why am I wrong?" I just went off.
Jack Jostes:
Yes.
Joe Hanauer:
I honestly went off. I was so angry and so upset. It was actually a Zoom call. It wasn't a live call, it was a Zoom call. My wife was in the next room, and I got off that call and she came over to me and was like, "You lost that job." I said, "Yes, I did." But, the point was, that was the straw that broke the camel's back. At that point, I said, "Okay, I am charging design fees. I am charging consultation fees." Some people want to meet in person instead of doing a Zoom meeting. If they want to meet in person at that first meeting, that's where I charge a consultation fee. To have that in person meeting, I charge them $125. I don't really adjust it too much if they're a little further away or not. If I'm working two or three hours away, I might make it more just to cover some more of the travel.
Now we just took two different paths to get to the same point, either a Zoom meeting or a live meeting. At that point, I provide a design letter. The design letter will just sort of outline exactly what we talked about, what the scope of work is. I will usually include some sort of budget. I've been doing this long enough to know that patios of certain sizes are going to cost a certain amount. We can guesstimate about what plantings are going to be, and we can get pretty close to where a project's going to hand up. I do have a form, a design letter form on my iPad. If I am in live meeting and I'm 30 minutes away, I can write those things right down on my iPad. They can sign it right there and then. At that point, I'm not charging a consultation fee as much because it's incorporated in my design fees.
If they choose not to go ahead or aren't making a decision at that point in time, then yeah, I'll ask them for the consultation fee. Most people have the check ready for me. I get there and they just have it ready for me and are ready to go. But, if they're working through, on the design process and signing the contract, then I've incorporated that in. But, the important thing is I have them sign that on my iPad right away, because I don't want to drive 30 minutes again to measure. I keep my GPS with me. I keep my camera with me. If they tell me to go ahead and proceed, I measure the project right there and then, and I take all the photographs, and I'm all set and done.
Jack Jostes:
How does this actually serve the customer? A lot of times people hear, "Oh, you should charge for consultations," and their feeling is, and we talked quite a bit in this podcast about be being a good customer and paying your bills on time and taking care of people and serving customers. I love taking care of people. How does this actually serve the customer? What's in it for them to pay for a consultation?
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah. Well, first of all, I make the consultation worth it. Let's say, for example, someone has a grading issue. I can pull out that altimeter and I can create a zero mark. I can pace off through their swale and say, "Look, you just don't have enough pitch for the water to run. This is where your problem is." I think that's a very valuable thing to know. I also will give them just my design impressions, and talk about what I'm seeing. How, you're standing here in your kitchen window and you're staring right out at your neighbor's kitchen window. Do you really want to see Mrs. Jones or Mr. Smith in their pajamas every morning or every night, or would you rather have an evergreen or some sort of fence or something in between, or some sort of element to block that? I think they're getting real information from me on that, so I think it makes the consultation fee worth it. But, on the other side, I've already given them the choice to meet with Zoom for free, so I can explain to them how I work and go through a lot of things with them without charging them.
Jack Jostes:
Well, Joe, hey, this has been so great, talking with you and learning about your journey from doing door to door, to sell snow removal, to growing your company, to growing it now. I think one of the things that, you're really enjoying the work you're doing.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, I am.
Jack Jostes:
You enjoy doing design, and you're enjoying the technology you're using.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
I think it's inspiring, because so often we hear on business podcasts, and things, about how you have to keep growing and become the biggest thing ever. You don't, necessarily.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
You can grow a great company and have a great size. One of the things I love that you said was that your gross revenue went down, but your profit actually went up.
Joe Hanauer:
Yep.
Jack Jostes:
You're happier.
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
Congrats. Right? That's a pretty cool-
Joe Hanauer:
Yeah, well, thanks. Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
That's an accomplishment, I think.
All right. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of The Landscaper's Guide. I love hearing people like Joe share things like being a great customer. Right? We want to take care of our clients. We want to take care of our employees, and hey, let's be a good customer to our vendors. Those are key relationships. There's so much wisdom in today's episode. I love meeting with the green industry, and hey, I met Joe at an event at the Breakfast of Champions at the NALP event. I'll be hosting one of those this year in September. Be sure to check out NALP's Elevate Conference. We have lots of other really great events coming up, so check out landscapersguide.com/events to see a list of our upcoming virtual and in person events. I'm Jack Jostes, and I look forward to talking to you next week.